More on my fiction writing

December 05, 2011

Phoenix 101: Wallace and Ladmo

Lad Kwiatkowski, Pat McMahon and Bill Thompson.

I went to the Muppets movie over the weekend. It was all right. I never watched Sesame Street and the heyday of the Muppets television show was when I didn't even own a TV. In any event, I am a lost demographic to such benign stuff. I grew up in Phoenix, where we had Wallace and Ladmo.

Most children watched a clown show in their cities and towns. Not us. We were brought up on the very adult humor of the Wallace show, which ran from 1954 to 1989 on KPHO. The names changed, from It's Wallace? to Wallace & Company to the Wallace and Ladmo Show. What didn't change was the show's biting humor, satire and irony, along with classic slapstick and cartoons. For the rest of our lives all we could do was feel sorry for the children who were stunted by clown shows.

The regular cast featured Bill Thompson as Wallace, Lad Kwiatkowski as Ladmo and my friend Pat McMahon. Wallace, or Wall-Boy as Ladmo called him, was the host and butt of much humor. Ladmo was the everyman or everykid, full of fun and mischief. McMahon played a host of characters, many of which gave the show its bite. Among them was Gerald the brat, the nephew of the TV station's general manager; Aunt Maud, the doddering, bad driver old coot from Sun City; biker Bobby Joe Trouble; Captain Super, a parody of assorted super heroes, and Boffo the Clown, who hated children.

No one was safe from the show, which parodied local politicians, senior citizens, kids' show characters and rock bands (with Hub Kapp and the Wheels). Wallace would play Mister Grudgemeyer, occupying a bench at Encanto Park with his short fuse, and here would come Ladmo, innocently sitting next to him and eating potato chips or celery with such noise as to cause the Wallace character to do a meltdown. If you were young in the '60s in Phoenix, it was a joy to see all this. (Or young at heart: My grandmother loved it, too). Ladmo invariably got the better of Gerald, who was like every kid you knew going to Brophy or Judson. Captain Super couldn't lift much. Marshal Good was a bitter, has-been cowboy actor. We were all in on the joke, and much of the humor was very sharp and sophisticated. When people note my dry wit, all I can say is that I grew up with Wallace and Ladmo.

My friend Richard Ruelas is the best historian of the program, including with his bookThanks for Tuning In. So I'm giving my impressions of the era, not a definitive history. What few people knew was that Thompson was the brains behind the show and in many ways a broadcasting pioneer. Thompson (one of whose daughters was a classmate of mine at Kenilworth), came from privilege — the heir to a copper mining fortune (the Boyce Thompson Arboretum came from his kin). Although he used his memories from that gilded upbringing for the Gerald character, Thompson turned his back on the family money, left New York for the West and made his own way in television. Although the late Kwiatkowski was beloved and Ladmo Bags were treasures (I never got one), Thompson was the creative and business genius that brought the show forward, kept it thriving with not only kids but teens and adults, and made it a national first in many ways. Kwiatkowski was plucked from being a cameraman to become Ladmo, and his relationship with Thompson became frayed toward the end of the run.

My Wallace and Ladmo was in the 1960s, when Arizona held one-fifth of today's population and Phoenix was still recognizable as a very special garden city, surrounded by citrus groves, farm fields, the Japanese Gardens and then the pristine desert. KPHO was in a two-story building on First Avenue that has been restored. It sat right behind the Westward Ho Hotel, which was still a splendid first-class hotel (and has not been restored; talk about Phoenix's lost opportunities in microcosm). I was never fortunate enough to be in the studio audience for the show. But I hung around the station, which in those days was independent. Employees would give me and my buddies old commercials, which were on small reels, as well as precious NASA Facts films. I learned to splice film in the editing room. All this was in a bike-ride's distance from home. Phoenix was that kind of town in those days.

Ladmo died in 1994. Thompson, as far as I know, is still with us. A few years ago, Ruelas introduced me to him in Durant's. Now this was a living legend. He was cordial, but behind his smile I could see that bitter edge that he beautifully channeled to give Phoenix one of its most precious gifts. I could only imagine what the show would do with the cast of fools, poltroons, hustlers and elected criminals that pass for real life in today's Arizona.

Just rolled in from Minnesota and think Arizona has no history beyond your lookalike subdivision and "lifestyle center"? Check out the Phoenix 101 archive and then go back to home to Eden Prairie.

I did some drinking with a couple of Wallace & Ladmo hanger ons at the old Curve cafe and bar on the old Black Canyon Highway, just north of Deer Valley road, east side. Monk whose real name I didnt know and Larry Smith, or "Bulldog" who came out on stage shirtless wrapped in chains.
And then was the Lew King Rangers where you could get a toy badge and maybe meet Wayne and Jerry Newton. Or maybe Gary Peter Klhar. This show was not even close to Wallace and Ladmo.

jmav, Is that the came where a lotta of folks bend over and run and grope for a while then go in and take a shower and come back out and do it again. Those guys get a lot of money for playing grab ass.

Rogue,
Interesting you should mention Eden Prairie, Minnesota. Prior to my spending two summers there recently to practice qigong with a Chinese master, I would have thought of it as just another white mono-culture enclave spreading its values into Arizona. It may be or may not be true, but let me provide a couple of observations about Eden Prairie.

There was a tremendous public library with access to a deep collection of literature throughout Hennepin County. Most of the patrons were Somali refugees. What struck me was how well the refugees were clothed, fed and had good quality transportation. Obviously the community had dedicated a lot of resources for their transition into Minnesota. An Economist magazine article recently noted Minnesota’s approach to assisting immigrant transition and suggested it as a model for the US. Having spent most of my adult life in Phoenix, the contrast was stunning.

The supermarkets in Eden Prairie were a multi-cultural experience far exceeding the Hispanic/Anglo experience in Arizona. Eden Prairie is a technology hub and attracts thousands of foreigners from the sub-continent and the rest of Asia. Indians, Nepalese, Chinese were well represented. Not many Latin Americans though. It was more like Bellevue, not at all like Scottsdale.

I had a few discussions with well off suburbanites during my stay. The most surprising recurring comment was that they were willing to pay taxes for quality of life. Their appearance was similar to inhabitants, of say, the Biltmore, but their attitude toward community could not be more different.

Eden Prairie has easy access to an extensive and expanding light rail system and an excellent bus system to take one throughout Minneapolis.

Interesting JMAV. Phoenix does have a small Somali culture. Check out the strip mall about 5000 E McDowell. I once met a recruiter there for a police force in Somali. He wanted me to go train cops in Somali, I passed.

Cal,that is an interesting strip mall. It also had a lot of Sikhs hanging out there. Somalis speak Egyptian dialect Arabic, being from the Red Sea region, and it is a nice language to use. A lot of Africans use to chill in a coffee shop on 44th street south of Thomas. Cab drivers.

How could you Phoenix 'settlers' allow such a poisonous travesty to happen?

After too many lost years in Phoenix, watching it bloat like a sour cactus just before implosion, I am so glad to be back home in a thriving Midwest community with clean air and real neighbors. Phoenix sucks.

I am uncertain what a lot of these comments have to do with the article. W & L was an instution in Phx. They did a tremendous amount of public service work. The humor was definitely "adult". They would have had an absolute ball with todays "chuckleheaded" politicians,etc. Cal I also remember the "Curve". We high-schoolers in the 50s loved it because they never checked IDs.

To return to the topic: I love Wallace and Ladmo. No other kid's show compares. Ladmo Bag! Pathetic - remember when you sent your name on a postcard and they would pick it out of a barrel and if your name was one it, you could be on the show long enough to be introduced, sat at the bar and blurt out what prize you wanted from the shelf? I got a boat model and my brother got an Uncle Festus magic kit. We were crazed when we heard our names called out on the TV. We were also sick with the flu so Mom had to call and push our visit out until we were well. I never could get excited about the cartoons though (sorry Roger). The skits were always much better.

Jon: reminds me that my 2 kids, now in their late 40's have a closely-knit circle of friends with whom they grew up in the W&L era. While they don't appear to consciously avoid hanging with the newcomers, they also don't seem to feel much in common with them. Sets me to wondering whether there's some sort of "sort" going on here because I do the same.

Hope the door didn't smack you on your way out! Can you take some of your counterparts with you from the hinterlands so the bulldozing can begin sooner? Thanks!

Eden Prairie sounds like Chandler; except their idea of great transportation is a Caddy , Mercedes or BMW...I think Jon has spoken about what type of Minnesotans, or Midwesterners in general, we get as transplants here in Arizona. Unless they come for a job and are young (like many of my neighbors) they aren't usually the best of their breed. We get the cranky-old farts who settle in N. Scottsdale or Sun City who feel that back home has become too worldly.

And why has it been so damn cold lately??? Snow in N. Phoenix...

Anyway, I never had the privilege of watching Wallace and Ladmo. I have heard of them though. Hell, I haven't really seen much from the early 80's. I tried watching Mad Max recently, because Cal makes so many references to it, but feel asleep. Mel Gibson sure was gorgeous though; and Tina Turner was in that movie! Kind of cool. Besides Tina songs, all I know about her is what I learned from Angela Bassett in "What's Love Got To Do With It?" AND did you know Angela Bassett, Whitney Houston -among others- were in a great movie filmed in Phoenix and Scottsdale??? Great shots of the Biltmore form the late 90's, early 2000's...the movie is "Waiting to Exhale."

phxsunfan, Mad Max was a Z movie but I liked it. I dont watch Mel anymore since he got into religion. Same for the scientologist guy. I think Mels best acting was in Man Without a Face.
yours truly
wimpypisswhickle

JMAV, Minnesota is known for progressive politics. It elected Senator Al Franken, who wrote a book whose tongue in cheek title was "Lies (And the Lying Liars Who Tell Them): A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right".

Economically, as of 2008 Minnesota ranked 12th for per capita state and local taxes. Income taxes are progressive and top out at a marginal rate near 8 percent. The sales tax excludes groceries, drugs, and some services.

In 2007, Minnesota students scored first on the ACT test. Unlike Arizona it does not have "school vouchers" to allow public dollars to go to charter schools.

According to Wiki, " 'Minnesota nice' is the stereotypical behavior of long-time Minnesota residents, to be courteous, reserved, and mild-mannered. The cultural characteristics of Minnesota nice include a polite friendliness, an aversion to confrontation, a tendency toward understatement, a disinclination to make a fuss or stand out, emotional restraint, and self-deprecation."

The state is also known for "a strong sense of community and shared culture" (same source).

Note that the Midwest transplants who move to Sun City and Surprise to live (as opposed to part-time or visitor residents) and who are highly conservative as well as the most politically active snowbirds, come from "Wisconsin, Michigan, Kansas, and other points in the Midwest" (Minnesota not mentioned).

Cal, Mad Max was horrible. Try "The Road Warrior". A thousand times better. Same star, but takes place after the social breakdown rather than in the latter days of civilization. (Mad Max was just campy and perverse.)

Also, as long as we're recommending movies, try "The Year of Living Dangerously". (Also a Mel Gibson movie, coincidentally.)

Unlike Arizona it does not have "school vouchers" to allow public dollars to go to charter schools.

A terrible concept, it perpetuates the the narrow minded racist and religious perversion of like minded idiots.
I am for public schools because there are a smaller version of the real world. Think I will break out the old Sidney Poitier movie "Black Board Jungle"

Speaking of sheriffs, this appeared in The State Press recently (courtesy of Associated Press). Excerpts:

"In El Mirage alone, where Arpaio's office was providing contract police services, officials discovered at least 32 reported child molestations — with victims as young as 2 years old — where the sheriff's office failed to follow through, even though suspects were known in all but six cases.

"Many of the victims, said a retired El Mirage police official who reviewed the files, were children of illegal immigrants.

"...El Mirage Detective Jerry Laird, who reviewed some the investigations, learned from a sheriff's summary of 50 to 75 cases files he picked up from Arpaio's office that an overwhelming majority of them hadn't been worked.

"That meant there were no follow-up reports, no collection of additional forensic evidence and zero effort made after the initial report of the crime was taken.

"...Bill Louis, then-assistant El Mirage police chief who reviewed the files after the sheriff's contract ended, believes the decision to ignore the cases was made deliberately by supervisors in Arpaio's office — and not by individual investigators.

"I know the investigators. I just cannot believe they would wholesale discount these cases. No way," Louis said. "The direction had to come (from) up the food chain."

"Louis said he believes whoever made the decision knew that illegal immigrants — who are often transient and fear the police — were unlikely to complain about the quality of investigations. He said some cases also involved families here legally."

In Somalia, the show could have been called the "Warmong & Leymoon Show".
Pat McMahon would have played a pirate. The Leymoon Bag would contain grenades and a box of 7.62 NATO rounds.
It would have been a great hit except for...............no electricity.

Emil, This MCSO info has been around for some time and given a different political climate would have been a huge scandal.
Detective Jerry Laird and Commander Bill Louis are both retired Phoenix cops. Laird is a very competent investigator. However I fear many of these cases have gone SOUTH. I know of some cases where immigration worked out situations that allowed illegals to go back to their country of origin. End of those investigations. For the last 16 years as a PI about 50 percent of my work has been for the defense or as some say "the dark side". I have noted on many occasions that many cases and not just the MCSO have suffered from an apparent bias or just plain laziness and carelessness. That said I have also seen many cases that were a work of science not art.

Sheriff Joe tried to give a half-ass and halfhearted "apology" for the "oversight" in the El Mirage "investigations". 12 Deputies and investigators will be severely punished. I think the voters will severely punish Arpaio in the next elections and send him on his way with Pearce.

I found this on Fox News LATINO! (clutches pearls)...is this a division of Glenn Beck's Faux News?

A native Arizonan, a Democrat and theatre artist, which puts me in a sub-set of a sub-set of a sub-set. Wallace & Ladmo was just part of growing up here. I wrote a play about W&L that is opening this March in Carefree and then moves downtown to the Herberger in June. For more info. visit centennialtf.org. The play tells the story of the rise and fall of Hub Kapp and The Wheels. A mock rock band that got it's start on the most unlikely of "kids" shows.

I decided to make my career here because I knew this wasn't going to stay a small town. I really miss a lot of the old trappings of the valley. We've grown a lot and now we're hurting like a lot of other places. But the Phoenix metro area has tremendous potential. AZ is about to celebrate it's centennial, the last of the lower 48 to do so. We're a young state with a great future.

Grudgemeyer looooves to feed the birds. I remember fishing at Encanto Park and seeing Wallace and Ladmo scuba-diving for golf balls. They didn't need the money, they were just genuinely eccentric, I guess. If Ladmo had won his race for Mayor on the free root beer in all the school water fountains platform, Phoenix would be a better place, and the dentist's woulda' been richer.I read somewhere that Mike Condello (Salt River Navy/ spoof on St. Pepper's lonely Heart's Club), committed suicide in California. Thanks for the tip on Richard Ruelas' book, I'm gonna see if I can find it.

The local boosters/apologists think the Phx economy is "doing OK". By this analysis, Mexico's economy is doing great, since it's unemployment rate is below 6% (let's just forget about poverty, wages and the underemployment rate of 25% or more)

When your unemployed abandon give up looking, or abandon the city, driving down the unemployment rate,your economy is not "doing OK".

My question to Robb is - what was GMP growth when the construction sector was large, and what is it now that the construction sector has contracted? (hint: much less)That would be a better indicator of a lop-sided economic base than the unemployment rate.

Also, the Wallace and Ladmo theme makes a great ringtone. It's like a Phx native radar.

I went to Brophy in the early 60s. There were a few kids who came from real money, but if they weren't boarders from the East or Midwest, you'd be hard pressed to pick them out from the crowd. There were many upper middle class kids, sons of professionals and merchants. Most of the boys were middle class and working class. Kids didn't flaunt it if they had it. Though there was some class stratification, wealth and status weren't as important in Central Phoenix as in Scottlsdale/PVal, say, or in other regions of the country, for that matter. Maybe because a lot of the wealth was newly derived and from agriculture and ranching?

If there was ever a topic to hijack, this is it. I recently came across an op-ed discussing laws proposing to drug test all welfare applicants. Here's my response. Note that I couldn't post the comment because, even after deleting the intro and much of the technical note, it still exceeded the 4,096 character limit.

Greetings, Slim. I first read this column in the "Times Publications" monthly of greater Phoenix, Arizona.

The case again widespread testing of all welfare applicants is actually much stronger.

First, most welfare recipients do not receive cash payments. According to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, in 2008 only 1.7 million families received cash assistance (out of 3.8 million receiving welfare under the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program that year).

The most powerful argument against this sort of testing is statistical. Drug tests are not perfect: they not only miss some drug users, they also falsely implicate non-drug users (the latter results are called "false positive"). The accuracy rate of drug tests against false positives can be high (99.x percent) but that is a theoretical rate which assumes (contrary to field practice) the absence of administrative and procedural errors by the staff of private drug testing companies.

If the field accuracy rate is as high as 98 percent against false positives, that means that 2 percent of those tested will be falsely accused of drug use and denied benefits. This means that in 2008, about 76,000 families receiving TANF assistance would have been wrongly denied assistance. This is especially problematic for proposed laws in which welfare applicants are required to pay for drug testing and only receive a refund if results are negative.

Since we're concerned with addicts among welfare applicants, let's look at addictive drugs used by adults. According to the U.S. Department of Justice (National Drug Intelligence Center), in 2008, among adults 18 or older, 5 percent abused prescription drugs; 0.44 percent abused crack cocaine (the form most likely to be affordable by anyone on welfare); 0.4 percent abused methamphetamine; and 0.16 percent abused heroin. (Slightly more than 11 percent of American adults used marijuana in 2008 according to this source: but since the issue raised by your essay is funding addiction, let's excude marijuana.)

While incidence of drug use may be higher for those in poverty than in the general population, national rates are a reasonable starting point for a discussion.

If we look at the three most destructive and addictive illegal drugs, crack, meth, and heroin, and add the use rates together, we find that 1 percent of the population used at least one of these drugs in 2008. Applying this to total welfare (TANF) recipients in 2008, we find that tests would detect roughly 38,000 of these hardcore drug users.

In other words, by applying drug tests to all welfare recipients, we would wrongfully deny benefits to twice as many innocent applicants (and their families) as we would in denying benefits to hardcore drug users (and their families). Note also that since some individuals may use more than one of these drugs, the total number of hardcore drug users detected would actually be less. How much less is difficult to estimate.

Including prescription drug abuse is questionable, first because there are so many drugs to test for and it might not be cost effective or practicable to do so: also, since it isn't a question of drug presence or absence, but whether the drug in question is legally prescribed, a positive test result would require additional investigation to determine if use was legitimate or not. Marijuana can easily be tested for, but again we're concerned with taxpayer subsidized addiction, and it isn't physically addictive. In any case, the number of innocents wrongfully accused and denied benefits remains the same.

Legislators who are not "math literate" may not realize the problem involved: it occurs when the number of guilty persons is a small fraction of those tested. This is why drug tests are generally best applied to criminal suspects against whom observational or other evidence exists, instead of using them as a method of weeding out drug users from the general population.

Technical Note: Incident rates for the 18 and older population were extrapolated from data given in the DOJ reference cited above, which gives rates for the 18-25 population and the 26+ population. At the time in question, 18-25 year olds were about 15 percent of the population, and those 26+ were about 60 percent of the population. To get the 18+ abuse rate for prescription drugs, for example, where the use rate among 18-25 year olds was 12 percent and the abuse rate among individuals 26 and older was 3.3 percent, I simplified by assuming a total universe of 75 individuals, 15 of whom were 18-25 and 60 of whom were 26 and older. Multiplying 0.12 times 15 gives the number of 18-25 year olds abusing, 1.8; multiplying 0.033 by 60 gives the number of 26 and older abusing, 1.98; adding the two gives the total number of individuals 18 and older abusing, 3.78; and 3.78 divided by 75 gives the use rate for the 18+ population, 0.0504 or 5.04 percent. In all cases I rounded the final result to the nearest tenth of one percent.

I noticed when your calculations went astray...........when you started with GOVERNMENT SUPPLIED STATISTICS !!!!

I'm not yelling, just making a point.

If I saw that the government studied the sun and found that it rose once a day and set once a day, I wouldn't trust those numbers. I would check for myself.

I understand and support the point you and Slim are making, but Lord, don't base any of the argument on the government stats. They are lies. All of them. All the time. If the government was faced with a situation where the truth would suffice, they would lie.

I've tried three times now to reply to Cal's erroneous point about suspects "going south" but am unable to post the comment. Perhaps Mr. Talton can do it for me. This is the third time this has happened in about two weeks.

"The National Drug Threat Assessment 2010 is a comprehensive assessment of the threat posed to the United States by the trafficking and abuse of illicit drugs. It was prepared through detailed
analysis of the most recent law enforcement, intelligence, and public health data available to NDIC through the date of publication.

"The National Drug Threat Assessment 2010 includes information provided by 3,069 state and local law enforcement agencies through the NDIC National Drug Threat Survey 2009. State and local law enforcement agencies also provided information through personal interviews with NDIC Field Intelligence Officers (FIOs), a nationwide network of law enforcement professionals assembled by NDIC to promote information sharing among federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies."

The report also uses information based on a National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) sample survey for the year in question.

So, exactly what do you proposed that I "check for myself", and why, and how?

I was going to look into demolishing Robert Robb's column on Arizona's recovery (as seen through the rose-colored glasses of the booster-club) but between time wasting non-posting comments and time wasting computer systems (the Phoenix Public Library system slows down to a crawl whenever I listen to music at pandora.com) I don't have time. Maybe tomorrow.

Cal, the problem wasn't that the suspects "went south" -- they didn't need to -- it was that there was no investigation. This was not a professional law enforcement response:
"That meant there were no follow-up reports, no collection of additional forensic evidence and zero effort made after the initial report of the crime was taken."

Got it now?

As Laurie Roberts noted in her column today, "Of the 432 botched cases, Arpaio’s detectives were able to go back and make only 19 arrests. Another 116 were declared unfounded and 67 were classified as “cold cases” (cold, as in ice age). Meanwhile, 221 were "exceptionally" cleared, which is code for we can’t solve them but we’re going to close them anyway to boost our clearance rates."

The MCSO has long abused the "exceptional clearance" category, not only in sex crimes but in general, as the Goldwater Institute noted in its report "Mission Unaccomplished" dated 12/2/08:

Judged by its own standards and statistics, MCSO appears to be falling seriously short of fulfilling its core law-enforcement duties. The surge in violent crime rates since 2004 coincides with MCSO’s diversion of substantial resources to other priorities.

. . .In 2008, MCSO reported that while it cleared 7,200 cases (out of 9,500 cases investigated), only 1,300 (or 18 percent of the cleared cases) culminated in an arrest, leaving a huge question about how the vast majority of cases were "cleared." For instance, the Phoenix Police Department actually reports more arrests than clearances (suggesting that in many instances more than one person was arrested for a crime). Among violent crimes that Phoenix cleared in 2007, over 78 percent culminated in an arrest.

The low arrest rates correlate to what appears to be MCSO’s excessive use of the category of "exceptionally cleared" cases coupled with inadequate priority on meaningful investigation of many serious crimes. A case may be designated "exceptionally cleared" only when a suspect is known and enough evidence exists to make an arrest, but circumstances beyond the control of law enforcement prevent an arrest.

The Tribune recounts the instance of a 15-year-old girl in El Mirage who entered a convenience store and reported a rape to the store’s manager. Paramedics took the girl to a hospital, where evidence of sexual assault was found. The sheriff ’s office dispatched a detective from the special victims unit to the hospital, but thereafter it appears no investigation whatsoever took place.

Yet less than a month later, MCSO closed the case as "exceptionally cleared," despite having no suspect and while still awaiting DNA evidence.

That case does not appear an aberration. Cases that are "exceptionally cleared" are supposed to be exactly that: exceptional. But they are increasingly routine in MCSO: In 2006, MCSO detectives closed 2,725 cases as exceptionally cleared -- three times as many cases as were closed by arrests.

The short answer to drug testing Welfare recipients is a no brainer. It's a waste of time. I dont need a government study to verify stupidity. Want to drug test something important. How about weekly pee tests for Surgeons, pilots, members of congress, etc.

Back to Wallace and Ladmo, thanks Jon for a great piece. I really enjoyed it and the comments. I am out of here, flying by the pubic library towards the Curve for a few of the old W&L gang

Author Carl Hiaason (spelling?)has challenged the Florida state legislature and Governor Scott to take drug tests, since they mandated them for welfare recipients there;he's even offered to pay for them. Should be funny to see how that plays out.